The desire to travel beyond the boundaries of time has been keeping humans busy for ages.


    Exploring the limits of nature’s laws and what lays beyond them is common for those drunk with curiosity. With every passing year, with every passing era - humans grew closer and closer to uncovering the secrets of time travel.


    At long last, the first time travelling machine was invented.


    Many doubted its credibility. Using the machine was deemed too dangerous.


    The machine they so yearned for was in their very hands, yet the fear of its capabilities was turning them numb.


    However, there will always be that one person who’s different. A person who, despite the risks, would gladly try out the machine in hope of proving its potential.


    That one person was Adam Brian.


    An accomplished scientist despite his young age, Adam was passionate about time travel theories. He faithfully believed in the time machine, which was founded by billions of dollars and engineered by the brightest brains of the century.


    Therefore, he had to become the fool who opposes order.


    He smoothly tricked the guards, many of whom he befriended during his work at the research facility. It required him very little effort to get access to the time machine’s room.


    “I’ll prove them all! This time machine works!”


    Like an excited brat, Adam broke through the digital security guarding machine. He then entered the activation credentials which he snatched from his boss.


    Everything was that easy. He believed that the universe itself blessed him and wished for him to use the time machine.


    He forced the hatch open. His heart started pumping when his hand touched the machine’s cold steel.


    The machine was created for that very moment. It was created for Adam to use it.


    He didn’t waste any time setting up the configurations.


    The destination of his travel was set to ten years into the past. Ten years ago... it was a time when his beloved was still alive.


    All the cables and connectors were set in place. Adam’s tinkering with the machine’s insides set off a loud alarm.


    But that didn’t matter. Nothing in “that time” mattered.


    The machine was already shaking wildly by the time guards surrounded the room.


    They were all too late. Adam already embarked on his journey through time.


    Adam was thrown into the past in speed that was either abnormally high or nearly nonexistent.


    He couldn’t tell if a second was a second, if a second was an eternity or if an eternity was but a second.


    All of his senses were thrown into disarray. The more he tried to use his reasoning, the more impossible it was understanding anything at all.


    Instead of thinking about the small details like a proper scientist - Adam decided to entrust himself to the flow. He quietly and patiently awaited the arrival at his destination.


    The travel reached an abrupt end.


    “Is this... the past?”


    He landed in a dark space, devoid of ground or floor.


    No walls. No trees. No computers. No cars. Such daily sights were nowhere in sight.


    “Haha,  the past? Of course not.”


    A voice called out to the confused Adam. It was a very familiar voice, yet one which he couldn’t quite recognize.


    “Who... who are you?”


    Adam’s mind froze once he laid his eyes on the mysterious speaker.


    It was beyond “unbelievable”. It was a paradox that made no sense.


    “Heh, can’t you tell? Or maybe you’re too thick to accept it?”


    The man in front of Adam wore a sarcastic smirk, but his eyes bore no ill will toward Adam.


    “Just look around you. You’re for one heck of a surprise.”


    Adam followed the man’s words. He turned around and examined his surroundings.


    Everything was pitch black. It was a void, torn from the rules of causality.


    However, black wasn’t the only color in the scenery. There were also white dots mixed in it.


    Adam closely inspected the dots... and screamed in terror.


    It was a nightmare.


    It had to be a nightmare.


    There was no other way to explain the nonsense in front of his eyes.


    Lie.


    Fiction.


    Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    Dream.


    Reality was the one thing this space couldn’t possibly be. It just couldn’t!


    “Shocking, isn’t it? Believe me, I know all too what you’re going through.”


    The man tried to comfort Adam to no avail. Adam couldn’t possibly accept it.


    “They are all... the same...”


    Scattered words conveyed that which terrified him.


    All the white dots were... humans.


    They were all men. They all had black hair. They all wore a white coat. They all wore glasses.


    Same faces. Same arms. Same legs..


    Everything was identical.


    They all were... the same person.


    The man standing in front of Adam wasn’t an exception either.


    “What is going on here...?”


    “Nobody knows for sure. It looks like a rift in time. That stupid time traveling machine was defective.”


    “For how long... for how long have you all been here...?”


    “No idea. Maybe a second. Maybe a thousand years. Who can say if time even flows here?”


    For a mere second to feel like thousand years and for thousand years to be but a brief second... it made no sense, but Adam somehow understood how it felt.


    “Do we... do we ever get out of here...?’


    “Never seen anybody leaving this place. I fear we’re kinda stuck here.”


    Stuck.


    Stuck.


    Stuck.


    Adam couldn’t even twitch. He had no strength in him to oppose the unrealistic reality.


    Adam just met that man, but he completely trusted his words. After all... the man wore Adam’s very face.


    “Heh, sweat it. You’ll come to terms with it. It was the same for me at first. It was the same... for all of us.”


    These words were both reassuring and disheartening.


    Adam was prophesied to overcome his shock... but he was also foretold that he’ll remain in that void for the rest of his existence.


    “I-is there anybody else here? Anybody?!”


    “No, there’s only... us.”


    “W-what about any materials? It can’t be completely void, right!?”


    “I’ve gone through all these ideas already. I couldn’t find anything.”


    The man in front of him, the more experienced version of Adam himself, wasn’t trying to discourage Adam.


    It was the simply the objective truth.


    All of them went through the same thought process. They all tried the same strategies and all of them ultimately failed.


    For somebody who arrived this late - Adam had nothing new to offer to the table.


    Everything he could think of - was already done.


    Any idea he could come up with - already failed.


    There was nothing but despair in that knowledge. One can hold onto hope as long as he has a chance.


    But for Adam... all of his chances have already been robbed; he couldn’t hope for anything.


    “T-then what about group brainstorming!?”


    “Done that too... far too many times to my taste. We couldn’t think up any new ideas even with twenty people.”


    “T-then-”


    “Killing yourself is also pointless.”


    “E-eh!?”


    Adam collapsed on his knees with teary eyes. He believed that suicide was so uncharacteristic for him that nobody, not even he himself, would ever expect him to suggest it.


    Being himself was already done.


    Being the opposite of himself was also done.


    If so.... what should he be? What CAN he be?


    “Ah, I see...”


    Adam allowed his body to fall forward and to drift aimlessly. Most of the area in his sight was filled with white dots, drifting around without purpose.


    He... just had to become one of these aimless dots.